And singing, dancing and flashing along,
Its life grew into a beautiful song;
It woke up the violets early in spring,
And they smiled to hear the brooklet sing.

No more to worry with business and care;
No more to labor for loved ones left here;
No more to long for the beautiful rest,
That only is found in the home of the blest.

DOST RECOLLECT IT, JENNIE DEAR ?

And they opened their blue eyes wider still When they felt the kiss of the laughing rill; And they could not tell which most to loveThe sky in the brook or the one above.

And some water-lilies, stately and fair,
Look'd down in the brook and trimm'd their hair;
Each smiled and nodded with peculiar grace,
As it gazed and wondered at its own fair face.

But the merry brook went dancing by,
Loving most of all the bright blue sky,
Till one day, when the sun was warm and bright,
A fairy creature of wondrous light

Bent over the stream, all light and love, With eyes still bluer than the sky above, And radiant tresses sprinkled with dew, Like a rose-tinted cloud in the ether blue.

When summer, like an elfin queen,

With blossom-circled brow,
Sat smiling on the pleasant scene,
So lovely in her sunlit sheen,

But not so fair as thou;
Dost mind it, in the forest green,
Jennie, my heart's own chosen queen,

We plighted first our vow?
Dost recollect it, Jennie dear?

'Twas such a day as this, When heaven seems to draw so near; We quite forgot, my Jennie, dear,

That we were in a world like this; 'Twas such a pleasant place, you know, That all the world did seem aglow,

Trembling, as we, with bliss.
And love has kept our promise green

Through many changing years;
But frosts have sered the woods, I
And Time's soft fingers, though unseen,

Have planted some gray hairs; But in our hearts, my Jennie, dear, The roses bloom as fresh and fair,

Though sometimes wet with tears.

And what do you think? This beautiful sprite Was the spirit of song from the regions of light; And when summer lay on her rose-curtained bed; The brook and the spirit were solemnly wed.

ween,

Now, the graceful lilies grew stately and wise, And the beautiful violets drooped their blue eyes, And the sky sometimes looks angry and tried, But the brook still clings to its phantom bride.

EDMUND K. HARRIS.

E

The daisies and the violets

Were pretty baby faces, That always looked up lovingly,

From out their hiding places.

And every bird that winged the air,

Was sacred in our sight, Like gleams of joy they fitted by,

Or sang for our delight.

Our hearts were full of love and truth,

We never doubted others; We saw no blight on Eden's bloom,

We counted all men brothers.

DMUND K. HARRIS, brother of Mrs. Mary

Ware, was born in Monroe county, Tenn., February 16, 1830. The earliest years of this gifted writer were spent amid his native mountains, breathing Nature's omnipotence in the strength of her hills. Thoughtsul, studious, literary, diligent in his research for wisdom, his tastes for books and storied authors were the consummation of a father's hopes, whose mind was a reflection of his own.

In 1844, removing with his father's family to Shelby county, Ala., he was placed under the tutelage of an eminent foreign-born English scholar, where he made rapid progress, subsequently assuming control of the Shelby Chronicle. Here his ability and accomplishments were so displayed that in 1857, when one of the editors of the Mobile Tribune was summering in the vicinity, he induced Mr. Harris to return with him to become a member of the editorial staff of the Tribune. Mobile was then prosperous, influential, the flower of Alabama cities, and was indeed to the entire South what Venice was to Mediterranean Europe in the fifteenth century.

Mr. Harris died April 16, 1859, when his adopted city was gladdened by the garlands and bloom of a tropic spring. His finely wrought nature was spared the soul-harrowing scenes of the Civil War, and at his death rare tributes were prompted to his memory from the illustrious in the world of letters over the South.

B. F. K.

And much we wondered life could wear,

For some the garb of sadness; We only saw the bright and good,

That clothed our souls with gladness.

And pity 'tis, that hearts should learn,

Such trusting hearts as ours, That sin and sorrow left their blight

Upon earth's fairest flowers.

He never knew the wrong and ruth,

That shadow's all life's gladness, His heart was full of light and truth,

But mine has learned its sadness.

STANZAS.

And from that life whose beauty seems

Sometimes a part of ours,
I catch the tender light that gleams

Amid earth's fairest flowers.

JUNE.

Come, beautiful June!
Our hearts are in tune
To welcome thy band,

The sweet minstrel throng; Oh, gladden our land

With beauty and song! Thy skies are the brightest, Thy breezes the lightest, Thy song bird the sweetest,

And gayest of tune, And thy roses are fairest,

O, beautiful June!

O LIFE! so dark, so bright, so evanescent,

My heart grows sometimes weary of thy thrall. Then I would burst these bonds of toil incessant,

Thy sin to flee, thy joy, thy sorrow-all! Yes, my tired spirit, faint and sorrow-laden,

Would fly away to some sweet isle of rest, There safe to lie, and, like a low-voiced maiden,

Beguile its woe away on Nature's breast. In the dim forest I have roved at even,

And, pensive, listened to the birds' sweet lay; And I have dreamed of a far home in heaven,

Till almost I forgot that I was clay.
Soul of the beautiful, thy spell around me

Would soothe to rest the throbbings of my heart, But iron fetter's galling chains have bound me,

Whose stubborn links in time will never part. O Freedom! blessed spirit, grand and holy,

Thou hast no dwelling underneath the sky, For men are bondsmen, weak, and vile, and lowly,

Born unto suffering, doomed to toil and die.

-June.

In yon bright sphere, far up the heavens eternal,

Spirit divine, is thy pure dwelling found; Soon may I revel there, mid bowers vernal,

Exempt from sin and toil, with glory crowned.

Ye tranquil stars; there is a magic in
Your wreathed charms, that halfway weans me

from
Myself; uplifts my struggling soul from this
Dim life, and purifies, and similates
To essence like yourselves, eternal.

THE INVITATION.

WILL you come with me, my own love ?

Dearest, come with me;
With me, to seek yon distant grove,

And tread the dewy lea.
Oh! sweetly blooms the early rose,

And sweet the hawthorn tree;
And wild, delicious music flows

From rill and bird and bee.

The night is lovely. Far along, where the
Deep shadows of the oak tree lies, the pale
Moonbeams for an instant rest and quiver.
The wind, low whispering in Night's still ear,
Dallies with the umbrageous boughs, soft fans
The trembling leaves of these great trees, and

lifts
Lightly the streamers on yon distant hill.
Here are some lowly flowers, that uplift their
Dewy eyes to mine. Fair flowers, so fragile,
Yet consummate of beauty, well ye do
Personate that sweetest of all human
Graces-Modesty.

Oh! in an hour like this,
In a spot like this—beside me one dear
Friend, whose smile, calm as the pencilled star-

light, Should all reflect my soul's deep love-it were Not pain, methinks, to meet the angel Death; Passing from heavenly calm on earth to thee, Serenity of endless bliss above.

The deer, uprisen from his lair,

Is skipping merrily; There's gladness in the perfumed air,

Then come, my love, with me.
The squirrel on yon mountain's brow

Plays gayly on the tree;
The rabbit, in the copse below,

Leaps joyfully and free.

“I STILL LIVE."

Just o'er the hills, in the eastern sky,

The early beams of morn,
In rosy lines of quivering light,

The fleecy clouds adorn.
All Nature calls; then why delay?

The grove, the spangled lea, Invite us forth, then come, my love,

Come to the woods with me.

THE DYING WORDS OF WEBSTRR.

STATESMAN, yes! tho' cold and lowly,

In the silent tomb,
A living light, intense and holy,

Bursts the gloom.
Bursts the gloom! A Nation, weeping,

Beholds that light, Like the morning sun-beams creeping

O'er the night.

MIDSUMMER-NIGHT.

Still he lives. O, yes, forever

And forever more! The light of such a life can never

Fade from all Time's shore.

How beautiful the night! How lovely now
Yon fair, broad moon! Emblem of purity,
Fit type of gentle love, my heart to thee
Leaps with impassionate yearning. Hearts to

thee,
In fond forgetfulness of earth, and sin,
And care, in every age have leaped; and thou
Hast felt their warm devotion, Moon, and with
A smile more sweet, more holy than thy wont,
Repaid the love they gave. E'en so, it seems
Thou smilest now.

Through the deep azure, gleam The countless stars of heaven. Have

ye

before E'er looked so beautiful as now, sweet orbs ? Ay, oft! and yet my soul was never thrilled With so deep a sense of your near presence.

Thoughts immortal, thoughts eternal,

His spirit bore; These bloom on earth, like flowers vernal,

Bloom evermore.

My Country, in thy darkest hour

Look up, and see In his words of strength and power,

Hope-Liberty!